Tags: settlement

The lawsuit against Airbnb’s de-listing of Israeli settlement properties sounds pretty flimsy: religious discrimination (illegal settlements are by definition all-Jewish); failure to provide equal access (Palestinians are barred completely – and it’s their land); Airbnb is siding with Palestinians against the occupation (everything about the occupation and settlements is illegal, so, yeah).

Booking.com needs to take a stand against occupation by de-listing properties located on stolen land in Israeli settlements The popular global tourism company Airbnb recently announced its decision to de-list properties in illegal Israeli settlements, a move which Human Rights Watch (HRW) praised as “a stand against discrimination, displacement, and land theft.” Now it’s time for Booking.com to…

Palestinians who rely on olive harvests for their livelihood have been terrorized by Israeli settlers since the beginning of the occupation in 1967. Settlers – often guarded or assisted by Israeli military – destroy trees and equipment, steal large quantities of olives, kill livestock, and attack Palestinian farmers.

In the ongoing travesty of justice, some olive groves are only accessible to their Palestinian owners for a few days a year; swaths of farmland has been appropriated by Israel for settlement expansion or military use.

Airbnb is doing the right thing by de-listing properties in illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank. The Anti-Defamation League is pushing back – but its arguments fail to hold up to even the mildest scrutiny.

Recently released Israeli documents show that Israel secretly funded an insurance company for settlers, in addition to planning for 20,000 new units in Ma’ale Adumim worth 3 billion shekels (over $800 million), an East Jerusalem settlement built on confiscated Palestinian land.

In addition, settlement activity in Hebron continues, and Israel is trying to have international human rights observers removed.

Other troubling new governmental actions and policies have also been adopted.

Palestinians have always had just 3 wishes: a capital someday in Jerusalem, a return to the 1967 borders, and the Right of Return. Between Trump and Israel, there’s nothing left to even dream of: the barest minimum is disappearing – food, medicine, the title of “refugee.”

Palestinian rights groups and local governments have challenged an Israeli law that seeks to the annex of parts of the West Bank. The Israeli government responded to the petition, stating that “the Knesset [is permitted] to legislate laws everywhere in the world” and that it is authorized “to violate the sovereignty of foreign countries via legislation that would be applied to events occurring in their territories.”

Israeli water policy is diabolical: the water table beneath the West Bank is being siphoned off by Israel and rationed to Palestinian farmers, sold at exorbitant prices; Israeli soldiers destroy water pipes and greenhouses; Israel walls off the Jordan River itself from Palestinian use; and water is piped away from refugee camps into illegal settlements.

Amid all this injustice, Palestinians carry on with patience and dignity. To exist is to resist.

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